Assignment 1 (Individual In class test)

With the aid of relevant examples, critically assess whether the challenges being experienced in the
post colonial education system in Africa derive from the colony or the post colony.
Due date: Last day of second block

• When Zimbabwe achieved Independence in 1980, it inherited an educational

system based on inequality of opportunity for the four main racial groups -
Coloureds, Indians, Europeans and Africans.

• After independence black pupils started to enrol in Group A schools, which were
formerly for the whites but these had to come from mainly middle-income
Africans who had taken residence in low-density (formerly European) suburbs.
The strict zoning system did not (and still does not) allow African pupils living in
high density areas (formerly African Townships) to enrol into schools that are
situated in low density suburbs. This means, therefore, that it is mainly those
African pupils whose parents have a high economic status and live in formerly
European suburbs that the system allows to mix with white pupils in school.
There is no known case of any white child attending a Group B school in the high
density areas

• At Independence in 1980 the Zimbabwe government adopted a policy which

aimed at widening access to schooling for all children. School fees were phased
out and non-white children began to attend former white fee-paying schools in
urban areas. More primary and secondary schools were built in rural areas.
Adult literacy groups were formed and those adults who could not attend schools
during the day because they were employed, began to attend night schools
(Mutumbuka, 1989)

• More women in Zimbabwe began to attend schools after Independence but to

this day sex differences in enrolment numbers still prevail. This can be partly
accounted to a number of factors such as cultural and economic. Most parents,
due to poverty, gave priority to their sons' education and encouraged young
women to get married after completion of primary school. This trend had not
been phased out completely. According to Dorsey, et al (1991) even those girls
who go further to higher schools, end up opting for training courses in nursing
and teaching after *O' Level due to lower aspirations.

• Attempts to eradicate inequalities in educational provision based on racial,

socioeconomic or gender lines are continuing. However a number of inequalities
are still pronounced. For instance pupils in rural areas still do not have access to
good quality education. Most of the children have to walk long distances of
fifteen to twenty kilometres each morning in order to attend the nearest school.
Walking long distances has an impact on rural pupils' performance (Dorsey,
1991). Urban children in high-density suburbs are also finding it difficult to be
enrolled in well equipped schools which are situated in low density areas because
of the zoning system and their socioeconomic status.

• Family income to some extent has therefore replaced race as the principal
screening factor in certain schools. This means that the most economically
disadvantage*! rural pupils continue to face a critical shortage of teachers, no
teaching materials, shortage of books, poor housing, little government subsidies
 and general isolation.

• For as long as the education system in Zimbabwe is dominated by economic

factors, it will continue to suffer disparities in the distribution of facilities despite
the great efforts made so far in attempting to eliminate these inequalities.

• In South Africa to this day, despite the achievement of majority rule, most
Africans are still deterred from attending those schools that were specifically for
whites and institutions which are supposed to be the easy forward move towards
the multicultural society within which they eventually have to make a living. It is
the whites who still wield most of the economic power, yet these form only 5% of
the country's population.

• Education in South Africa today is still organised in ways which limit access to
quality education for blacks, thereby preventing the majority population from
competing with whites for key positions in the occupational structure. The same
trend experienced in Zimbabwe regarding inequality of school enrolment
opportunities seem to prevail.

• In its first year, the ANC-led government made positive strides towards the
establishment of a single education system by insisting that the segregated
national and regional education departments should all come under one wing.
However, to this day, over-crowding, under-funding, lack of textbooks, lack of
equipment, inadequate buildings and a shortage of teachers due to under-staffing
remain the hallmark of African township schools. Yet many white schools
continue as before, resistant to the change that are being brought by the
country's first democratic government. Just like Zimbabwe, the zoning system
also applies.

• In the Primary and Secondary school sectors, there is inadequate provision of

schools especially in the commercial farming areas and the newly established
resettlement areas where about a fifth of the population lives. The majority of the
schools that exist in these areas do not qualify for registration under the
Ministry's criteria. The unregistered schools do not receive Ministry inputs such
as the supervision, and grants in-aid.